Historical contribution
What Pascal contributed
The topic begins with early modern devices associated with Wilhelm Schickard, Blaise Pascal and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, but it should not be narrated as a parade of solitary inventors. These machines grew from long traditions of numerical notation, abaci, counting boards, clockmaking and precision metalwork. Pascal's calculator was designed around addition and subtraction for administrative arithmetic.
Why it mattered
Reduces the mental and written burden of executing repetitive arithmetic procedures.
Connected topics
Where this fits in ITEM
Evidence
Sources and further reading
- Calculators collection
Computer History Museum
- Comptometer
Smithsonian
- Leibniz and Curta
Computer History Museum
- Thomas Arithmometer
Computer History Museum